DAY 41 – 44 ~ DENALI NATIONAL PARK

 Denali National Park and Preserve covers 9,419 square miles making this the largest national park in the US and the only national park in the US that was created to preserve its wildlife rather than it's vistas or history.  This park has spectacular views of snow capped mountains and varicolored tundra and forests of Black Spruce (those tall wiry, skinny trees that lean over) and lots of willow bushes that the animals love to eat. Oh, and this time of year, lots of wildflowers.

  

Check out the pic above.  Do you see the round thing at the tip of the Caribou's back hoof.  That's one of my own painted rocks.  Hidden in plain sight.  When we were leaving the park to return to our trailer, the rock was gone.  Someone had found it, but still has not reported it or re-hid it.  Check out my group "Traveling Turtles Peace Rocks" on face book.  I have painted 10 rocks to hide around Alaska.

We are spending 4 days in this area. We are staying in the town of Healy, about 5 miles outside of the Park.  

After 121 miles and 2 hours we arrived at Denali RV Park and Motel.  This RV park is a bit run down and the sites are too close together.  But it was quiet and convenient. 

The below picture is our view at the back of our trailer.  The sun set at 11:20pm.  This picture was taken an hour later, about 20 minutes after midnight.  It does not get any darker for the rest of the night.  
I could never get used to this.

  

The first night we found a nice place to have dinner in Healy; Black Diamond Resort.  This is where I found my second painted rock.  Denali Rocks is group of Brownies and Daisies from Healy, AK that paint rocks and hide them.

  

The next 3 days we saw a sled dog demonstration, did a short hike around Savage River, and took a tour into the interior of Denali NP.

Denali NP Scenery

The one and only road into the park is 92 miles long; Park Road.  The public is only allowed to drive 15 miles of that road.  You can either take one of the 3 narrated tours on the “brown” bus or ride to certain destinations (like the campgrounds) on the “green” bus.  You are allowed to drive past the 15-mile point if you are only going to one of the campgrounds.  Once you are there you stay put.  No driving around.  You have to use the “green” bus. 

  

Mt. Denali has a North peak and a South peak.  The North peak is 19,470 and the South Peak (the true summit) is 20,310 feet making it the highest peak in North America.  Denali means “the high one” in the Athabascan Indian language.  The peak and park were once called Mt. McKinley by the National Park Service. The locals always called this peak and the park Denali.  In the early 2000’s.  President Obama officially renamed the Park to Denali. 

We saw some spectacular views and scenery along the first 15 miles into Denali NP. 

Wildlife

The only wildlife we saw in the first part of the park was moose.  We saw a mom and two kids run across the road.  By the time I got my camera out, they were part way in the bushes.  Another time we saw two moose on the side of the road enjoying a meal of willow.

  

Dog Sled Show

During the winter in this park, transportation is by dog sled.  The sled is used to go deep into the park to check out the wildlife and to patrol the park itself, to transport supplies, etc.  This facility houses, breeds, and trains the Alaskan Husky to pull the sleds.  You take a bus to this facility and visit the dogs and see a demonstration of how these beautiful dogs are anxious and love pulling the sleds (with wheels for the demonstration.)

Savage River

The 2-mile loop trail around the Savage River is located at the end of the 15-mile mark of Park Road. You cannot drive past that.  The Savage River Loop trail travels through some of the oldest rock formations on the North American continent; estimated to be 600 million to a billion years old.  Can you imagine looking at or even touching a rock that has been in existence for a billion years.  

This trail is a nice walk with beautiful scenery and lots of rock formations with ribbons of quartzite, mica, phyllite, slate, marble and greenstone twisted into interesting patterns.  And the river is running strong with lots of rapids.  Savage River, a perfect name for it.  The 2-mile trail took us a long time to walk it; every few feet I had to stop and take pictures.

 Can you find Slowpoke (Beanie Baby turtle that travels with us)

Arctic Ground Squirrel

Tundra Wilderness Tour

On our last day we did a 7 hour “brown” bus tour about 50 miles into the interior of Denali NP.  Our goal was to see wildlife.  What is really great about the “brown” bus tours are that the driver has a digital camera with a 40-power zoom.  He can zoom in on wildlife way far away.  And the wildlife we did see was not close enough to take pictures with a regular camera.  Sometimes you will be lucky and they will be near the road.  On this tour on this day, they were not.  There are video screens throughout the bus and as the driver videos the animals they appear on these screens. 

 The first wildlife we came upon was a family of red foxes.  One of the passengers sighted this family and called it out.  When you see wildlife you are supposed to yell out “STOP”.  This family was so much fun to watch.  There were about four pups and they were running around and frolicking with each other in the grass.  They were close enough to the road where we could see them clearly, but not close enough for me to take a descent picture.  During the rest of the tour we saw lots of Dall Sheep, a Grizzly with two cubs, Caribou, and a Golden Eagle flying around then taking a dive to the ground.  We did not see what it caught because it was behind a bush. 

  

Oh yeah, we saw a moose walk across the front of the bus in the parking lot before we took off on the tour.  It was so quick, most passengers did not see it.  And I saw a bald eagle on a tree top close to the road but did not have time to call it out.  Later the guide was saying that it was rare to see bald eagles in the park…darn.

  

It was a beautiful, sunny day with lots of beautiful scenery.  We were glad to take the time to do this tour.

Can you picture a bus coming down or up that narrow road.  It was scary!

50+ miles to this point.  Now we turn around and head back.

3.5 hours in, 3.5 hours out.

Next is Part II of our Alaska adventure.  We will traveling south to the Kenai Peninsula and visit the small towns in that area before heading back into Canada. 

DAY 36 – 40 ~ FAIRBANKS

Fairbanks is a large city with a population of 31,000 where the Chena River runs through the middle of the city.  There is a lot to see and do in this city.  We will be visiting Fairbanks for five days.

  

After 200 miles and 4 hours we arrive at Riverview RV Park in North Pole (just outside of Fairbanks).  Riverview sits alongside of Chena River.  It’s a fairly nice park that is clean and well maintained.  There is cable TV with HBO, Showtime and Starz, and free WiFi, but weak signal.  We won’t spend much time here as we will be busy seeing the sights.

 

  

Downtown Fairbanks

First thing we did was go downtown and look for a place to eat dinner.  While there we explored a few blocks and checked out some shops.

Many of the downtown commercial buildings enjoy low space heating costs because they are hooked up to a steam and hot water system piped beneath the streets.  There are 23 “snorkles” scattered throughout downtown that provide air intake and exhaust.  Because they are boring to look at, in 2012, they became an art project; “Art in the Heart: Paint the Pipes”.  We walked around and found several of them.

 

 

  

University of Alaska, Museum of the North

The University of Alaska is a very large campus with lots of modern buildings and beautiful landscaping.  The Museum of the North is on campus and the building itself is of interesting architecture.  The museum is two levels of Alaska culture, wildlife, geography and history.  There is an Art Gallery of Alaskan art and an auditorium where we saw a movie on Winter in Alaska.  This is well worth the time to visit this place. 

 

In some of the rural areas, an outhouse is still used when there is no indoor plumbing.  So the people dress up their outhouses and make them as ornate as possible.

Santa Claus House

Of course, there has to be a Christmas store in the town of North Pole.  The Santa Claus House is a large, festive building full of holiday goodies.  If you ever visit North Pole, you must see the Santa Claus’ house.

Large Animal Research Station

This is part of the University of Alaska.  They research Muskox and Reindeer.  We spent a short time here.  We did a tour where an energetic college student told us all about muskox and reindeer and the research they are doing.  Very interesting.

  

Great Alaskan Bowl Company

This is an interesting place to visit.  They are one of only a few bowl mills left in operation in America.  They use machinery designed over a hundred years ago.  They can make up to 8 one-piece solid birch hardwood bowls ranging from 7 inches to 22 inches in diameter all from a singe split length of birch.  That way all the bowls match with the same grain and pattern.  Their bowls are beautiful, but very expensive.  It’s an interesting place to visit.

  

Georgeson Botanical Garden

This garden is also part of the University of Alaska.  It started out as a research garden in 1989. It’s a small garden but has a nice layout and beautiful plants and flowers.

Mom bird - no eggs yet.

Pioneer Park

Is a 44-acre park showcasing the history of Fairbanks.  This park opened in 1967 as the Alaska 67 Centennial Exposition, which celebrated the 100-anniversary of the purchase of Alaska from Russia.  The park has many of Fairbanks’s early cabins and buildings which have been moved from their original locations.  Admission is free. 

We visited the Pioneer Museum and explored some of the buildings, which are now shops.  It was in one of the shops that we found out about the Midnight Sun Festival that was happening that day in downtown Fairbanks.  So, after an hour or so we headed downtown.

 Buddy loves posing for tips

  

Midnight Sun Festival

This festival celebrates the summer solstice which happened on June 21^st.  It was the longest day of the year in Alaska, where the sun never sets and it is daylight for 24 hours. 

It was real busy downtown.  Three blocks of activities, bands, arts and crafts booths, food booths, children’s section, etc.  This festival continued way past midnight.  This is our last night in Fairbanks, so we stayed a few hours and then headed “home”.

From Fairbanks we travel south on the George Parks Highway into Denali National Park.